


On Purpose

by oakleaf



Series: As you ask [5]
Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Deaf Clint, Gen, Mind Control, Non-Graphic Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-24
Updated: 2012-11-25
Packaged: 2017-11-19 09:44:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oakleaf/pseuds/oakleaf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A movieverse take on the lead-up to and the aftermath of Clint's deafness. Very short.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A super-short fill for the following prompt at avengerkink. ([link](http://avengerkink.livejournal.com/8247.html?thread=17951031))
> 
>  
> 
> _I've seen a lot of prompts and fills that bring Clint's deafness into movieverse. Not so many that focus on how he became deaf intentionally, to avoid sound-based mind control. And I think that would be kind of a big thing for movie!Clint, considering what he's been through, so I'd like something that focuses on just the moments leading up to that, with the terror and the oh god not again never again and relief when it's done, and the certainty that not only was it the right thing to do but the only thing he could have done._
> 
>  
> 
> I have no knowledge of the comics, only what I have guessed from other stories and Wikipedia. I know it's really short; it was written really quickly.

The music was lilting and discordant.

The moment he heard it he felt the familiar tug of another mind entering and commanding his. The feeling was not as strong this time and the hold tenuous and he managed to full free.

The music was still there though and it took him more and more willpower to keep his mind out of the other man's control.

He began to panic as he recognised the feeling of being under someone's rule once again. He didn't want to have to fight his friends again and he definitely didn't want to let himself into that cycle of self-hatred and panic and insecurity again.

He did not want to lose control over his actions again.

His control over his mind slipped for a moment as those thoughts ran through it.

He quickly pushed everything from his mind as he sought to regain control and to find a way out.

The answer presented itself to him after a moment's thought.

He pulled out the sonic arrow that was meant to be fired and set it off, just as he felt his control over himself slip.

A moment of blinding pain and silence reigned.

He screamed against the pain and forced the last vestiges of control from his mind.

And relief reigned in his mind and he knew that they would not control him again.

It was the best way – no, actually, it was the only way.

He had control - he was free.

The world faded to black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Originally published at the prompt and [on my ffnet](http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8345241/2/As-you-ask) on 10 August 2012.]


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone asked for a sequel to the previous chapter over at the kinkmeme. I quote: 
> 
> _**Anonymous:** *whines* *grabby hands* Oh Clint. Well, good thing Stark seems to like you. He'll either fix it or make it better than new!_   
>  _**Me:** A!A: Thank you for the kind comment! Yeah, I like the thought of Stark fixing him up. But that's a whole 'nother story :)_   
>  _**Anonymous:** Will you, perhaps, maybe, be writing that fic? Please? Because that would be amazing!_
> 
> This happened.

He locked himself in the lab.

"JARVIS. Pull up everything I've ever looked at with regards to biomedical engineering, any tech that has miniaturised microphones and the most recent research articles to do with the development of hearing aids."

"Certainly, sir."

The screens around him sprung to life.

A thousand glowing words surrounded him, bright white-blue light against the dim lighting in the room.

He closed his eyes for a moment, clearing all the side projects he was running in his mind, pushing them aside for the time being.

When he opened his eyes, his mind was focussed on this alone.

His eyes scanned over the text, learning things quickly that took others much longer. His mind pieced together the theories, drawing the connections that took others experience to find, let alone understand.

He had made his way through several research articles and several more dated designs before he closed his eyes momentarily once again.

He let his mind place the last puzzle pieces, opening his eyes, then reaching for a stylus that he had been making some skeleton notes with.

"Clear the table," he ordered, waving his arm over the place he usually did his designs, causing all of the documents that were open to disappear.

He started sketching, laying out the proposed circuit to one side at the same time as putting the exterior shape together.

At one point he stopped, tired, after nearly thirty hours awake.

He seemed lost in thought for a moment, before coming back to himself, grabbing the stylus tightly and writing in large, capital letters in the corner of his design. He lifted this text up and slid it to the corner of the hologram, standing perpendicular to the table's surface.

At fifty hours, his body couldn't take only caffeine and bites of food for a moment longer and his eyes drifted shut and he slumped into his chair, head resting on the table, stylus still in hand.

He saw the way the archer had known that using the sonic arrow was the only way out, but the way he was now, he would never be as effective a sniper as he had been.

He knows that the other man knows the consequence of his actions, but can't stop seeing the hurt of no longer being fully a part of the team.

It breaks his heart to see the acceptance in the other man's eyes that he's leaving everyone else behind and the only way he recognises that feeling so vividly is that he remembers his own eyes when he thought he was dying.

He couldn't leave him like that.

He was an engineer, after all, and it was simple matter of learning biomedical engineering. What was the point of his genius if he didn't use it for his friends - his family?

Clint walked down to Tony's lab, having just left the supervision of the doctors and nurses a few hours before.

He hadn't seen the genius for a week now, and was curious about what Tony was up to.

When he made it to the glass entrance to the lab, he saw an exhausted tony sleeping against a benchtop, a bright hologram of a hearing aid hovering above the table and some bright text on a corner of the table.

He could just make out the text.

He knocked loudly on the door - or at least, he thought it was loudly, and it did wake Tony. Tony walked to the door and opened it, tiredly saying, "Yeah, come in, I'm nearly done."

Clint's eyes had trained themselves on Tony's lips and had managed to figure out what the other man had said.

Tony hadn't really realised he'd been speaking until he started to drink his coffee. He spluttered, waved his arm over part of the table and wrote "SORRY" on the table in his messy, all-caps scrawl.

Clint laughed.

"I can lip read. Comes with the job. What's this?" he added after a moment's pause.

Tony looked at Clint through sleepy eyes. "Making hearing aids."

"Why?"

He pointed to the corner with the text.

'I FIGHT FOR MY FRIENDS.'

"Okay... and?"

"You look sad. You want to stay as part of the team. You need your hearing. I fight for my friends. Hence I build hearing aids."

"Thanks."

"I like you."

There was a moment's silence before JARVIS interrupted it.

"Sir, the initial fabrication is complete."

Tony headed over to a machine and pulled out two small objects.

"Try these."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I had this great profound phrase in mind and then I forgot it. Oops.
> 
> [Originally published at the prompt (link in previous chapter) and [on my ffnet ](http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8345241/3/As-you-ask)on 12 August 2012.}


End file.
